Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1887-02-24
FICTION IN POLITICS.
no" the Lie, Called History, Is Made Up
from Some Newspapers of the Period
The Tiiden Letter, the Vest Case and
the Presidents Message.

The Tiiden Letter, the Vest Case and
the Presidents Message.
There is ordinarily little use in pay.
ing any attention to political announce.
ments unless the evidence is conclu.
sively given The art of correct state
ment in print about leaders and parties
has disappeared from almost every
newspaper. If a politician says thing
himself in letter or speech that is
one thing. If in any journal, which
he can not be suspected of making his
medium, an announcement is made
concerning him, the announcement
may be accepted as certainly incorrect.
No list of current inaccuries can be
made complete. A few signal ones,
however. can be referred to.
Shortly after Mr.. Tilden's death. fol-
instance, a writer on the New York
Sun. A. NJ. Gibson, said that Mr.. Til
den had mailed to President Cleveland
a copy of his (Mr. Tilden's) letter on
coast defenses, which was formally adj
dressed to Speaker Carlisle. Mr.. Glib
son said: .'Mr. Tilden read to me the
letter himself and in my presence dis
patched copy to Mr.. Cleveland. -
This was written long after the letter
had become public, and shortly subse-
quent to Mr.. Tilden's death The in
tention was to acquit Mr.. Tilden of the
charge that had been brought against
him at the time of the publication OF
the letter. to the effect that he had
taken good deal on himself in adj
dressing Congress through the Speak
er, in advance of the Presidents mes
sage. on.a National subject, over the
President head. Mr.. Tilden had never
met the charge. John Bigelow, Man
ton Marble and Andrew H. Green had
never refuted it. They were the men
of all men who would be expected to
do so, for they did much of Mr. Til
denis writing business for him. G. w.
Smith. Mr.. Tilden's secretary, has
never met that charge. A. M. Gibson
sought to meet it with an explicitness
that was unmistakable. His statement
was accepted and commented on adj
verseiy to Mr.. Cleveland by all the anti
Cleveland papers, among which was
many n paper that had been anti-Til-
den. until it could use mock respect
for Tilden as club with which to hit
Cleveland.
The fact that the IN en- reported to be
nearest 20 Mr.. Tilden never dealt with
this matter has been referred to to at
tach to Mr.. Gibson's statement this ap-
pendix: Mr. Cleveland never received
any copy of that letter from Mr.. Til
den or any one else. The first he ever
saw of it was when he opened the
morning papers and found it in them
The authority for this statement is the
President himself He is not Il liar.
He is not dead. No one need wait I'M
til after his death to deny that he re-
ceived it or inquire of others than he
whether he ever received it. He is
alive. He can be asked any time.
This declaration is made without any
design of rejecting on A. NJ. Gibson S
certainty that he saw the letter mailed
to Mr.. Cleveland. 1t may have mis-
carried. The man to whom it was in
trusted for mailing may have lost it.
The only thing that is surely fact in
the case is that Mr.. Cleveland never
received that letter. He never
adopted and never has concerned him
self about the theory of having been
Sighted by the fact of the letter not
having been sent to him. Small sug-
gestions do not affect him. But he has
n opinion of that comment which has
cen based on the allegation that he
id receive the letter and took no no.
flee of it.
:, Another statement has been as posi-
lively made to the effect that the Presi-
dents sister. Miss r. f. Cleveland,
wrote that part of his first message
about Mormonism. The statement
was made in way to be offensive to
the President and the lady. 1t could
not have been more positively made
had it been made by either or both of
them. 1t was and is an an absolutely
truthless statement. The lady knew
nothing about that or any other part
of the message until she read it in the
papers. Intrinsically the state ment.
true or false. was unimportant. Nor
ally it has the character which any en-
tirely false declaration. large or small,
has. The squibs, slurs. argumenta-
tons and overt or covert sneers built
up on this often-reiterated lie have not
been few. They are multiplied con-
stantly. A quiet man in Washing
ton and Il studious lady at Holland
Patent know ut least two things: One,
that the statement is an, untruth; two,
that those who originate it and period
ically reissue it are aware that it is an
untruth. OF that impurity of the mind
which lie denotes, they also have an
opinion.
AS often and as specifically as the two
declarations indicated are made appears
another to the effect that Mr.. Daniel
Manning developed Grover Cleveland as
candidate for Governor at Syracuse. in
1882, and elected him to the office.
Mr.. Manning controlled the Albany
delegation at that convention. The
delegates voted against Cleveland on
every ballot from first to last in that
convention-one man excepted, Rufus
W. Peckham, who insisted on voting for
him and who did it alone. The eleven
Others voted for Slocum on every bal
lot. including the last pursuant to a
promise Mr.. Manning made to
General Slocum in Albany before
the convention. Every daily in this
State had the ballots in it on Sep
TENDER %, 1882. They will tell the
story. Yet nearly every daily will
continue the declaration which those
ballots confute to the end of time.